Desert Rain Read Online Free PDF

to hold both clouds and mountains.
    Later, when she was cold and wet and water overflowed her careful trench, Holly knew she
     would rue the moment she had greeted the storm with laughter and open arms.
    Yet at this instant she was like the land itself, hot and dry, waiting for the pouring
     instant of release.
    Sunset was as sudden as thunder. Light drained out of the sky between one moment and the
     next. Needles of lightning stitched randomly through the lid of clouds.
    Holly smelled rain on the wind, but no drops fell nearby. Somewhere above her on the
     mountainside clouds were pouring themselves into the land. Somewhere water was brawling
     down dry ravines, playfully juggling boulders as big as her Jeep.
    Somewhere the waiting had ended and the storm had begun.
    But not here, not yet. Here there was only her and the silence between bursts of thunder.
    Even when Holly lay within the tent trying to fall asleep, the rain hadnt yet come. It was
     cooler, though, almost cold. Lightning flared randomly over the rocky land, pulling
     thunder behind like another color of darkness.
    Then came a different noise, hoofbeats pounding down the mountainside.
    Holly couldnt tell the exact direction the horse was coming from. The rocky cliffs and
     ravines baffled hoofbeats, adding echoes that overlapped and faded and changed directions
     until she wondered if she had imagined the sounds in the first place.
    White light blazed directly over the tent, followed instantly by an explosion of noise so
     great she didnt immediately identify it as thunder. Blinding light and black sound
     alternated with dazzling speed.
    Wild hoofbeats rattled in the silence between thunderclaps. A horse screamed in fear.
     Somewhere near Hollys camp a horse was running over the rugged land mindlessly, terrified
     by the storm.
    She came out of the tent at a run. She knew there was little chance of helping the
     panicked animal, but she couldnt simply cower in her tent and listen to the horses
     terrified scream.
    She ran to the shelter of a boulder field just up the slope from her tent. Crouched with
     her back to the wind, Holly stared into the night, trying to find the horse.
    An explosion of sheet lightning lit up the sky from horizon to horizon, freezing time into
     a black-and-silver portrait of a horse rearing wildly on the low ridge just above her
     camp. Nearly lost in the horses long, flying mane, a rider fought to control his crazed
     mount.
    For an instant it seemed the rider would win. Then thunder came again, breaking apart the
     world. Black sound and white sky melded into light so fierce that the eye couldnt see,
     sound so brutal that the ear heard only silence.
    Lightning continued in an incandescent barrage, outlining the plunging horse. Holly knew
     the ridge, knew it was impossible for a wildly running horse to keep its feet.
    With each new stroke of white light, she expected to see the horse go down, smashing
     itself and its rider against granite boulders, killing them both.
    And then a chill greater than the rain swept over Holly as she realized who the rider was.
    Linc!

Desert Rain
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    Holly called Lincs name again and again, screaming at him to jump and save himself.
    She kept on screaming even though she knew he couldnt possibly hear her. The thunder was
     so loud and continuous now that she couldnt even hear herself, though her throat was
     tearing apart with the force of her cries.
    Yet still Holly screamed at Linc to jump off, because that was the only way he could save
     himself from the mindless terror that drove his horse.
    Horse and rider kept plunging together down the dangerous, boulder-strewn slope.
    Holly made an anguished sound when she realized that Linc had no intention of abandoning
     the horse to its own terror. He was sitting deep in the saddle, using all his strength and
     skill to keep the horse from going down, riding a whirlwind with a savage determination to
     save both of